The present invention relates to a broadcast program display apparatus and a broadcast program display method for displaying a broadcast program and digest views of other broadcast programs as superposed on the displayed broadcast program.
In viewing a television broadcast program (referred to as a program, hereinafter), users generally refer to the TV program guide of a news paper or an electronic program guide (referred to as an EPG, hereinafter).
An EPG is a convenient tool for users because it allows users to: use a key word according to their preference to pick up a particular program that includes the key word; and record a program or make viewing reservation so that users will not miss a chance of viewing their favorite programs.
However, users sometimes cannot know the contents of a program by just referring to the title of the program on the EPG.
In order to solve such a problem, there is a technique to display digest views for programs on an EPG so that users can select a program based on the digest views.
With such a known technique, users can quickly find out their favorite programs. However, the known technique still has problems in that digest views are continuously displayed on an EPG even if the remaining time of a program is very short when he or she refers to its digest view or the program has already been finished, due to no time management being applied to the digest views. Thus, it could happen that a program is almost finished or has already been finished when users select the program by referring to the digest views, which makes them disappointed.